20 
House & Garden 
A beautiful example of 
marquetry is found in this 
bureau rondel made for 
Stanislas Leczinski, King of 
Poland 
THE ART OF THE INTARSIATORE 
Showing the Difference Between Marquetry and Intarsia and the 
Furniture in These Styles That Collectors Seek 
GARDNER TEALL 
J UST what should be 
called intarsia and 
just what should be 
called marquetry will 
best be understood by 
noting that intarsia is a 
word derived from the 
Latin “interserere,” to 
insert, w’hile marquetry’ 
is a word derived from 
the French word “mar- 
queter,” to spot, to mark, 
to speckle, to checker. 
From this it w'ould ap¬ 
pear that one should, 
strictly speaking, apply 
the term intarsia to work in which the space to 
be occupied by the design was first carved out 
of the wood and then filled in with bits of 
wood of other sorts and colors (as well as with 
ivory, mother-of-pearl, bone, metal in some 
sorts of intarsia), skillfully cut to fit the de¬ 
pressions exactly, and all finished off to a flat 
“Narcissus”, an in¬ 
tarsia panel by 
Gardner Teall 
surface, while the term marquetry should be 
applied to work with the pattern inlaid with 
thin sheets of different woods and other ma¬ 
terials. 
In the latter work the thin sheets or veneers 
(one sheet for each separate material, color or 
“effect”) were all placed, one over the other. 
and cut through the overlying drawing of the 
design at the same time, producing, by this 
sawing process, the pieces which, much after 
the fashion of a picture puzzle, were fitted 
together and glued to the body of the piece of 
furniture so to be “inlaid.”- Nearly all of the 
inlaid work of the 17th and 18th centuries is 
marquetry of this sort as shown in the accom¬ 
panying illustrations. 
Inlaying is an art that reaches back to re¬ 
mote antiquity, and inlaid furniture was in 
common use by Assyrians, Egyptians, Greeks 
and Romans. The Greeks employed two sorts 
of inlay decoration—the sectile, which con¬ 
sisted of inserting ornament here and there 
upon the wood, and the pictorial, or decoration 
which entirely covered the surface of the wood 
with the design. 
In the Odyssey we find described Penelope’s 
bed, “made fair with inlaid work of gold, and 
of silver and of ivory.” Jausanias tells us of 
the Box of Kypselos in the Temple of Hera, 
which chest was of cedar partly carved and 
An interesting domestic scene is de¬ 
picted in this intarsia panel, enclosed 
in an elaborate border. Spanish, of 
the nth Century 
Dutch marquetry of \Uh Century 
workmanship is found in this remark¬ 
able bow-front corner cabinet 
The use of ivory intarsia, a favorite decoration, is 
found in this Italian cabinet, an example of \%th 
Century work 
The Queen Anne style of inlay is seen in 
this desk where inlay is combined with 
burl walnut 
